"Clang~!"
A teeth-grinding metallic collision rang out, and the machete, its blade twisted like a pretzel, clattered to the floor. The Scavenger boss clutched his ruptured tiger's mouth, his teeth chattering.
He stared in shock at the black giant's hand, only to see cold metal beneath the torn skin.
This guy isn't human!?
Before Lawrence's leaf-smoked brain could process what had happened, the big man had already swung a fist, knocking him to the ground.
Stars exploded before his eyes; his limbs felt alien.
Lawrence's vision blurred, and he fumbled helplessly at the ground, trying to get up, only to be grabbed by his clothes by a large hand and pulled upright.
Then came the wind from a violent movement, and a crunching sound of bones snapping as a skull was slammed against a wall. Lawrence, his head flattened, slid down the wall to the ground, ending his wicked life and descending to hell with only half a head remaining.
Berry, standing behind him, didn't even twitch an eyelid.
As they ascended the stairs, the other party's sneaky posture, huddled behind the crates, had already been clearly detected by Arno's thermal imaging, making the sneak attack a joke.
Stepping over the fool, Berry pulled open the door and entered a slightly cleaner room.
Inside, there was an office desk, a desk lamp, and a computer—none of which mattered. What was important was the safe in the room.
The moment Berry saw that safe, her eyes went wide and couldn't move away.
She could practically smell the ink of the money.
She pulled it open with one hand; that fool hadn't even locked it.
What was inside? Duh, it was stacks and stacks of eurodollars, Berry's favorite.
Grabbing a random cardboard box, Berry stuffed rolls of banknotes into it.
Inside, there weren't just banknotes, but also many credit chips containing various sums of money, and some scattered necklaces and jewelry, likely stripped from victims.
But no matter what it was, Berry took it all.
"What is this strange thing?"
Berry found a chip, but it wasn't a credit chip. This one was entirely black, looked more precise, and more expensive, like a data bank used to store confidential information.
But, who cares.
After studying it for a while without understanding, Berry still tossed it into the box. She would have plenty of time to research it once she got back.
"Something seems off."
After Berry finished packing all the valuables, she saw something amiss downstairs from Arno's monitoring perspective.
Several cars stopped at the entrance, and a group of armed personnel disembarked.
Was it Scavenger reinforcements? Or NCPD agents responding to the gunshots?
Berry closed the box, clipped it to her waist, and, gun raised, was about to rush downstairs with Arno. She didn't want to be trapped on the second floor with nowhere to escape.
"Damn it, Viktor!?" Just as Berry cautiously poked her head out at the staircase landing with her gun, she saw an unexpected person at the entrance: the Cyberware Doctor Viktor.
"Oh my god, Berry!" Viktor led his people rushing in, also shocked to see Berry, but even more stunned by the piles of Scavenger corpses on the floor. The place looked like it had just experienced a massacre.
"This, this was all you did!?"
Viktor and the accompanying armed personnel were dumbfounded, especially Viktor, whose sunglasses were almost slipping off his nose.
"Just a small contribution." Seeing that they were allies, Berry relaxed, stood up, and walked down.
"But, Viktor, why are you here? And who are these people?" Berry leaned against the stairwell, looking at Viktor and the people behind him with great confusion.
She hadn't asked Viktor for help, so how did they know to come here?
"You rushed out earlier, and I was a bit worried." Viktor struggled to tear his gaze away from the corpses on the floor and looked at Berry, slowly explaining why they were there.
"I have a buddy who works in Kabuki. After asking him, I learned that the Scavengers were gathered here, and in large numbers. I was afraid of delaying you, and I didn't dare call you, so I just brought a few friends to support you."
"Who knew we'd hear gunshots at the intersection? We rushed over, but I never expected you to take care of so many Scavengers all by yourself. My god, Berry, you're even better than the Mercenaries from Afterlife."
It was at this moment that Viktor somewhat recovered from the shock of Berry single-handedly annihilating a group of Scavengers.
"Of course, who am I? The future Night City legend, the fiercest and most ruthless Mercenary Berry!"
Berry placed the money-filled box under the driver's seat of the van, then leaned against the car door, showing off to Viktor and the Mercenaries who had come to support her. However, no trace of the ruthlessness she boasted about could be seen on her face.
"It's settled now. The car is back, most of the goods are recovered, and most importantly, the troublemakers are gone. From now on, Kabuki's cyberware market is ours." Berry patted the front of the car, proudly telling Viktor.
"Yes, yes, I never would have thought," Viktor said with emotion, pushing up his sunglasses.
He had originally planned to come out of retirement once to help Berry, but he never expected her to be so formidable. Aside from witnessing Berry's achievements, he hadn't helped in the slightest.
Today's young people are truly amazing.
Viktor sighed, feeling that he truly was a remnant of the old era.
"Oh, by the way, Viktor, aren't you going to introduce me to your friends?" Berry raised an eyebrow, feeling a bit bewildered by the eager gazes of the gunmen.
Was she really that impressive, worthy of such admiration?
"Oh, them." Viktor, realizing, smiled at the gunmen. "They're not so much helping me as they are here to see you, the boss of the 'Hive' group, Berry."
"Hmm?" Berry raised an eyebrow, looking at the smiling Viktor with eyes full of confusion.
She was a bit confused about the current situation. These people came to see her? What did that mean?
"Many of them are my patients, and also users of the cyberware you produce…" Seeing Berry's puzzled eyes, Viktor began to explain.
These gunmen were all veterans of the Fourth Corporate War.
The issue of veterans in Night City was a messy one.
During the war, corporations, in their pursuit of victory, abused psychoactive drugs on these soldiers and installed powerful military cyberware that caused significant physical damage. After the war, however, they simply cast these veterans aside.
The pensions and post-war treatment promised before the war were all nonexistent.
Many veterans, in addition to their poverty, suffered from the mental oppression caused by cyberware and drug withdrawal symptoms. To numb their painful nerves, many of them repeatedly used tranquilizers, developing a dependence on them.
Veterans who couldn't make ends meet were unable to afford the high costs of medication and cyberware maintenance, so they had no choice but to join gangs, selling their combat strength to survive in exchange for cheap tranquilizers to numb their suffering nerves.
However, many veterans were unwilling to stoop to working with gangs. They chose labor jobs, working as security guards or construction workers, earning a living through hard labor, and enduring the pain of their cyberware and drug withdrawal symptoms alone in dilapidated rental rooms at night.
Over time, many people simply couldn't withstand the mental strain, and under extreme pressure, they turned into Cyberpsychosis victims, going on rampages in the streets.
Night City police officers publicly stated that out of every ten Cyberpsychosis cases, at least four were committed by retired soldiers.
Because of this, the people of Night City grew increasingly discriminatory and hateful toward these retired veterans, making their situation even more difficult.
Viktor had dealt with similar incidents before.
As a Cyberware Doctor, he helped poor retired soldiers maintain their cyberware and perform regular sterilization at a relatively fair price.
However, this was only treating the symptoms, not the root cause. If these soldiers didn't replace the military-grade cyberware designed specifically for war from head to toe, they would eventually run into trouble.
They would either commit suicide under torture or transform into Cyberpsychosis victims and go on a killing spree.
But now, Berry's cyberware seemed to be having some effect.
Several retired soldiers who couldn't afford to replace their standard cyberware used Berry's handmade knock-offs, only to discover that this semi-plastic, semi-metal cyberware was gentler and didn't put as much strain on their nerves as other cyberware.
Therefore, it was normal for them to feel grateful toward Berry, who created this cyberware.
"That's all I know. Why don't you let them tell you themselves?" Viktor turned to a gunman whose right arm was cyberware. "Anthony, you wanted to thank Berry in person, didn't you? Now's your chance."
As soon as Viktor finished speaking, an excited Anthony stepped forward. "You must be the famous Berry. Thank you so much."
"This arm of mine was driving me crazy, but thanks to the cyberware you made, I can finally sleep at night now."
The man's tone was sincere and didn't sound like a joke; the expressions of the others were mostly the same.
It seemed that the imitation cyberware she created had some unexpected therapeutic effects.
Looking at the man's milky-white metallic prosthetic limb, Berry was a little surprised.
She had indeed built it. The cyberware looked white because she used hard ceramics instead of metal, but that shouldn't have affected its function.
Her hypothesis was that under the system's blessing, when she routed the artificial neural pathways, she moved the source of the cyberware drive commands to the skeletal actuators and the spinal nervous system, which greatly reduced the pressure on the cranial nerves.
This design was actually complicated and outdated. The only benefit was lowering the cost of the artificial neural pathways, as fewer were needed.
But she hadn't expected this outdated design to become a lifesaver for the retired soldiers—something Berry had never considered.
However, Berry remained silent because, judging by Anthony's excited appearance, he clearly wasn't finished speaking.
"Please let us work for you!"
The sudden request was startling; Berry nearly choked when she heard it.